The slap echoed through Natalie for the rest of the day. Each time she looked at her hand, she remembered the shock on Adrian's face. The feeling wasn't guilt. It was power. Raw, terrifying, and addictive.
At 4:45 PM, Margaret appeared at her office door. "Mr. Black wants the preliminary shipping division analysis before you leave." She placed a fresh folder on Natalie's desk. "And he asked me to give you this."
A black corporate credit card slid across the polished surface. Natalie Steele, the engraving read. Then, in parentheses: (Blackwood Global Holdings).
"Your signing bonus," Margaret said without smiling. "Mr. Black believes in immediate incentives."
Natalie picked up the card. The weight of it felt different, earned, not given.
She opened the new folder. Inside was everything Lucas's team had on Adrian's shipping division. Financials, client lists, employee records, even internal memos. The depth of intelligence was staggering. Lucas hadn't just been watching Adrian. He'd been dissecting him.
For the next three hours, she worked with relentless focus. The numbers told a story Adrian had been hiding from his own board. Rapid overexpansion. Questionable loans. A client concentration that made the division vulnerable to targeted attacks.
At 7:30 PM, she walked into Lucas's office. He stood at the window, watching the city lights come on below.
"I have your analysis," she said, placing the report on his desk.
He didn't turn around. "Give me the summary."
"The shipping division is Adrian's house of cards. He's leveraged it to fund other ventures. If we pressure three key clients to switch carriers, the whole operation collapses."
Finally, he turned. "Which three?"
She named them, Adrian's biggest shipping clients, accounting for forty percent of the division's revenue.
"And how do you propose we pressure them?"
"Blackwood can offer them preferred rates on your logistics services for one year. It'll cost you short-term revenue, but it will bankrupt Adrian's division."
A slow smile spread across Lucas's face. "You'd bankrupt your ex-husband on your first day?"
"He tried to bankrupt me yesterday," she said quietly. "This is just business."
Lucas picked up the report, flipping through her analysis. "You missed something."
She stiffened. "What?"
He pointed to a figure buried in the footnotes. "This loan from Zurich Trust. It's not just for expansion. It's collateralized against Steele Industries' main headquarters. If the shipping division fails, Adrian loses everything. Not just the division, but his entire company's home."
Natalie's breath caught. She'd seen the loan but hadn't traced the collateral. The implications were nuclear.
"You're saying if we do this..."
"Steele Industries goes under. Completely." Lucas watched her reaction carefully. "Still just business?"
The room suddenly felt cold. This wasn't just damaging Adrian's company. This was destroying his life's work. The company he'd built from his father's small factory into a billion-dollar empire.
Thousands of innocent employees would lose their jobs. Collateral damage in her personal war. She thought of the headquarters building where she'd spent countless evenings waiting for Adrian, where she'd dreamed of their future together.
"Problem?" Lucas's voice was neutral, but his eyes were sharp.
"Thousands of people work there," she said. "They have families."
"Adrian should have thought of that before he leveraged their jobs against a risky expansion." Lucas moved closer. "This is why I hired you, Natalie. Not for your memory, but for your nerve. Do you have it?"
She looked at the report in his hands. At the numbers that spelled destruction. This was why Lucas had wanted her. Not just for her knowledge, but for her willingness to cross lines he couldn't cross alone.
"What's the alternative?" she asked.
"The alternative is you take that credit card, check into a nice hotel, and wait for Adrian to win the custody battle he'll inevitably file once he recovers from today's humiliation."
The words hung between them, cold and precise. There was no middle ground. No gentle path.
She met his gaze. "How quickly can you contact the three clients?"
The corner of his mouth twitched. "I already have meetings scheduled with all three tomorrow. I just needed to know which ones to pressure."
Of course he did. Lucas Black didn't wait for permission. He created facts.
"Then I guess we're doing this," she said.
He nodded toward the door. "Go home. Your first day is over."
"Where is home, exactly?" The question slipped out before she could stop it.
Lucas studied her for a moment, then picked up his phone. "Margaret, book Ms. Evans a suite at the Four Seasons for the week. Corporate account." He hung up and looked back at Natalie. "Temporary solution. We'll find you permanent housing once this first phase is complete."
The Four Seasons. A world away from the Starlight Inn. A world away from the life she'd left behind.
As she gathered her things, Lucas spoke again. "One more thing."
She turned.
"Adrian will retaliate. Probably within twenty-four hours. Be ready."
"How do you know?"
"Because it's what I would do." He turned back to the window. "And I'm never wrong about these things."
The elevator ride down felt longer than it had this morning. The credit card burned in her pocket. The Four Seasons suite awaited. The destruction of her ex-husband's empire was underway.
She had gotten everything she asked for. So why did she feel like she'd just made another deal with the devil?
As she stepped out into the cool night air, her phone buzzed. An unknown number. Her heart leaped. Was it the anonymous sender again?
But the message was from a different number entirely:
Saw what happened today. You're braver than I thought. Be careful. Lucas plays for keeps. Ask me how I know. -E
E? Who was E, and how did they know about her meeting with Lucas?
She looked up at the Blackwood building, at Lucas's lighted window fifty stories above. The game was more complicated than she'd realized. And she was only just beginning to learn the rules.